I was one of those hapless consumers. When we moved into our Shanghai house I was not initially alarmed by the window mounted fans in the bathrooms and kitchen. It was a different approach than the fans installed in ceilings that I was used to in the US. However, they build with concrete in China so I could understand the path of least resistance was a thin pane of glass rather than twelve inch thick reinforced concrete.
The only trifling problem with the window fans was their lack of a screen covering their blades. They appeared remarkably dangerous. But really, who would be stupid enough to stick their finger in a fan? As it turned out, I was.

I am not a thrill seeker or even particularly curious. I am, however, rather fastidious. I was cleaning the window and my hand inadvertently passed in front of the fan. It must have sucked in a few fingers. I jerked back my now fiercely throbbing hand expecting to see a bloody stump. The intense pain made me dizzy. I carefully climbed down from the toilet seat I was standing on and wrapped my hand in a mass of tissue.
I hobbled over to a chair and slumped into it. By now I was both queasy and faint and my hand felt like I did not let go of the grenade. At this point I was approached by the pair of four-legged furry men who share our home. To them, I am the “help” so I knew they were not there in a support capacity. Please. Cats? They were more worried about how the can of Friskies was going to get opened that night now that the “help” was indisposed.
As my head cleared and my nausea abated I got up to survey the damage. The cats looked relieved. I teetered over to the bathroom and gingerly opened my makeshift bandage. It could have been worse. The fingers were intact but the finger nails were history. Since I had crummy nails to begin with it was not such a devastating loss. However, I did hope they would return someday. Losing a few fingernails now seems minor compared to almost frying an entire arm.
Shanghai resides on the southern bank of the Yangtze River. Like New Orleans, this is a low, marshy floodplain; which means bugs. Amazon jungle, size of your head kind of bugs. Especially mosquitoes. Once again, my dwelling conspires against me. Because just like the window fans, the windows themselves had no screens on them. Not that I would open windows to allow in the chemical-laden Shanghai air, but I did have to open the front door occasionally.
To fight my mosquito war I possessed a few weapons in my arsenal; both offensive and defensive. My defenses consisted largely of chemical weapons. My body armor consisted of a spray that probably contained chemicals that had been banned by the Geneva Convention. The label depicted a person surrounded by what resembled a Star Trek inspired force-field. I would have preferred a Romulan cloaking device. It glistened on exposed skin making me look like a Mr. Universe contestant, sans muscles. As an additional line of defense, I burned mosquito coils on either side of my front door. My house either looked like a Buddhist temple or some New Age retreat.
Fly-swatters were too low-tech for back to the future China. Showing up on store shelves in March like a harbinger of spring were little electrified tennis racquets. Killing as sport may have gone out with Teddy Roosevelt, but the Chinese brought it back by combining technology, necessity, and sport to create mosquito killing tennis. Killing a mosquito is a satisfying accomplishment any time, but even more so mid-flight; do unto them before they tap into you. A loping mosquito however, hardly compares to the manic, erratic flight path of their fellow pestilence disseminators, flies. Killing, whether it is a mosquito or fly, is a community service making the world a safer place.

My primary offensive weapon, WMD for flying insects, was the Kill-O-Pest. It was an industrial-strength bug zapper. The advertising literature proclaimed, “If it flies, it fries.”
I was pleased to observe a full tray of bug carcasses at the bottom of the Kill-O-Pest just days after it was put into operation. I had heard a rumor that the Kill-O-Pest zapped bugs with such intensity that it blasted their body parts out in a 14 foot radius. Upon closer examination of the fatality catch tray I noted with disappointment that most carcasses belonged to flies. Not that I did not want to kill flies, I did. It is just that I wanted to kill mosquitoes even more. Perhaps pudgy poo eaters have more heft to them than mere blood-suckers. Presumably, mosquitoes, being less substantial than flies, now had their little legs, wings and thoraxes strewn about my living room. Odd as it sounds, I was somewhat comforted by that thought.
I now had proof that the Kill-O-Pest did in fact kill. My hope was that it would kill all the flying pests in the house. Despite the lack of dead mosquitoes, the tray was full and looking a little gross so I turned off the bug execution device in order to empty it. As I reached for the tray my hand lightly brushed against the coils and zap; the Kill-O-Pest was trying to kill me. My arm flew up and almost detached from my body. I went skidding back across the wood floor with the other arm trying to break my fall. My personal air defense artillery just mistook my arm for a flying insect.
I stared in disbelief at the Kill-O-Pest, with the switch in the off position. Perhaps off does not mean the same thing in Chinese.
What a SCREAM! I hope your arm has recovered! I am sending this to my mom...she's certainly never heard of a Kill-O-Pest, but if she ever sees one, she'll know better than to try it now!
ReplyDeleteHi,
ReplyDeleteMy name is Michelle Redden. I am a friend of sonje Beal. I live in Shenzhen. It would be great to get together in Hong KOng. We go there often. Love your blog.